Archive for the ‘North Waziristan’ Category

A Canadian journalist abducted this week in Pakistan’s northern tribal region was working on a documentary film for the Al-Jazeera network, media reported Friday.

Beverly Giesbrecht, 52, also known as Khadija Abdul Qahaar, was seized at gunpoint on Tuesday while traveling in the Bannu district of Pakistan’s Northwest Frontier Province, which borders Afghanistan.

AFP

The daily Globe and Mail, citing Pakistan’s high commission in Ottawa, said the former magazine publisher who runs a website offering Islamic news was on a freelance assignment for the Arab language network when she was taken.

Her visa application was supported by two letters from Al Jazeera, verifying she would be doing freelance work, said the newspaper.

“The letters say … she will be reporting on the new government and the wider political situation, including the war on terrorism” for a documentary, high commission spokesman Mammona Malik told the newspaper.

**************************

A gunman ambushed a Japanese reporter and an Afghan colleague Friday, wounding both men and their Pakistani driver in the latest attack on foreigners in Pakistan‘s volatile northwest region in three days.

Security appears to be crumbling in Peshawar, a city of 2 million where an Iranian diplomat was kidnapped Thursday and an American aid worker was killed Wednesday.

By RIAZ KHAN, Associated Press Writer

Motoki Yotsukura, Asahi Shimbun‘s bureau chief, was in a car with Sami Yousufzai, an Afghan who has worked for Western publications including Newsweek, when the assailant opened fire, police said.

“Three armed men intercepted our car, and one of them aimed his pistol at me,” said the Afghan, Sami Yousufzai, from a hospital. “He opened fire when I put up resistance. I got a bullet in my hand.”

Yotsukura was wounded in the leg, police said. The injuries to Yousufzai and the driver also were not life threatening.

Asahi Shimbun reported that Yotsukura, 39, had left earlier Friday from Islamabad on a reporting trip to interview people close to the Taliban.

Officers were investigating whether the attack was an attempted assassination or an attempted kidnapping.

Peshawar and the nearby lawless tribal area have seen a rise in attacks on foreigners. A Chinese, an Afghan and a Pole are currently being held after being seized in the region, which is also home to criminal gangs who kidnap for ransom, drug runners and smugglers.

DERA ISMAIL KHAN, Pakistan – A suspected U.S. missile strike killed three people late Saturday in a town near the Afghan border, the latest in a series of attacks in a region where top al-Qaida leaders are believed to be living, two intelligence officials said.

Two unmanned drones were seen above Miran Shah in north Waziristan minutes before missiles hit a factory in the town, they said, based on reports from informants in the town.

Above: U.S. Predator drone can be missile armed….

The pair said three people were killed, but no other information was immediately available. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media. U.S. officials were not immediately available for comment.

Al-Qaida and Taliban fighters have established bases throughout Pakistan’s semiautonomous tribal regions, where they are said to plan attacks on U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan as well as violence in Pakistan.

Under U.S. pressure, Pakistan has carried out military offensives against insurgents while also trying to woo various tribes to turn against extremists. But in recent weeks, the U.S. has signaled its impatience with Pakistani efforts.

The U.S. is suspected in at least 11 missile strikes on the Pakistan side of the Afghan border since mid-August, killing more than 100 people, most of them alleged militants, according to an Associated Press count based on Pakistan intelligence numbers.

Dear Sir,I hope that you and your team at the Peace and Freedom will be alright. I shall repeat my words that Peace and Freedom has been doing a great job by liberating people of tribal areas from terrorists. Now most of the tribesmen have been recognising the role of Peace and Freedom. What the Peace and Freedom has been writing for the last several months is becoming true. You have been doing a great job. You have been saving the world from further death and destruction.

Now the terrorists after defeat in tribal areas have shifted their activities to big cities of Pakistan. Attack on the Army bus near the General Headquarters is indication that terrorists have been trying to get control of the country.

President Pervez Musharraf must now show seriousness in war on terror otherwise the terrorists may take control of Pakistan, which will be disastrous for the whole world.

There are distrubing reports from Waziristan tribal areas where most of the dreaded terrorists have hiding. According to a newspaper report, A pause in the ongoing military operation against Taliban militants in South Waziristan is being seen as a temporary halt to pave way for a truce in the troubled region, residents and elders believe.

However, Inter-Services Public Relations Director General Major General Athar Abbas told Daily Times he was unaware of any offer from militant leader Baitullah Mehsud as was earlier reported by some media outlets.Asked why the military had stopped advancing or even firing, he said it might be a lull to consolidate their positions, and added that “there is no ceasefire at the moment”.

He said any peace deal was related to the civil administration.

However, an unofficial source privy to previous talks between the government and the Taliban militants in the area said efforts were underway to secure a peace deal.

The source remained elusive when asked if the Taliban had made any offer for a ceasefire with the government. The source added, “There is a temporary ceasefire.”

Although the government has not made an official announcement and reports of scattered incidents of firing have been arriving from certain areas, the two sides are striving to secure a permanent peace deal, the source hoped.

He said the Taliban had not requested tribal elders for negotiations with the government, nor had the government assigned the elders any task to start negotiations. There were yet signs that both sides were inclined to reach a truce to bring calm to the area, the source maintained.

Locals confirmed there had been no artillery shelling by security forces or attacks on checkposts by militants since Friday. The locals believe, however, it might be due to excessive snowfall in some areas.

Reports about a ceasefire offer by Mehsud have appeared at a time when troops have made advances against militants in Waziristan, and army officials say they have come close to hideouts of the militant commander.

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan – The U.S. missile strike that killed a top al-Qaida commander just over a mile from a Pakistani military base shows how entrenched Islamic militants are in the lawless tribal regions, where extremists have launched increasingly bold attacks.

The targeting of Abu Laith al-Libi also suggests American intelligence is improving and that President Pervez Musharraf is willing to turn a blind eye to attacks along the Afghan border if they avoid civilian casualties.

Pakistan has yet to confirm the death of al-Libi, reported Thursday on Islamic extremist Web sites and confirmed by ….

A senior al Qaeda leader responsible for numerous attacks on American troops in Afghanistan and elsewhere was killed several days ago in Pakistan in a missile attack that an Islamist Web site blamed on the U.S.

Abu Laith al-Libi, a known top-tier commander of al Qaeda’s combat operations in the region and No. 12 on the U.S. most-wanted list, was killed in his compound in a village about nearly 3 miles outside Mir Ali in North Waziristan. An Islamist Web site first reported al-Libi’s death, which it blamed on the U.S., saying yesterday he had been “martyred” but not describing how. The site did not say who might succeed him.
“We congratulate the Islamic nation for the martyrdom of the sheik, the lion, Abu Laith al-Libi,” said a banner which appeared in a section of the Web site.

DUBAI (Reuters) – A leading al Qaeda member in Afghanistan, Abu Laith al-Libi, has been killed, a Web site often used by the group and other Islamists said on Thursday.

A banner on the Ekhlaas.org site said Libi had fallen as a martyr, without giving further details.
.
It was not immediately clear if Libi’s death was linked to a suspected U.S. missile strike that killed up to 13 foreign militants in Pakistan‘s North Waziristan region this week.

The attack had targeted second or third tier al Qaeda leaders, according to residents in the tribal area.

MIRAN SHAH, Pakistan – A missile destroyed a suspected militant hideout in northwestern Pakistan on Tuesday, killing 12 people inside, officials said, as hundreds of students protested Pakistan‘s support for the U.S.-led war on terror.
.
In clashes elsewhere in the volatile region, militants killed a government soldier and injured four more.

MIRAN SHAH, Pakistan (AP) — The army halted attacks on villages near the Afghan border Wednesday to give residents time for funerals after days of fighting that killed as many as 250 people, a local schoolteacher said.

Ten residents went to the army base in Miran Shah, the North Waziristan region’s main town, and military officials “assured us that just for today there would be no action so that the funerals of the locals could be held and the injured treated,” Hafiz Muhammad Wali, the teacher who led the group, told The Associated Press.

The raid was the latest in a series of bloody militant attacks on security forces and abductions of soldiers since July, when a pact with militants broke down and commandos stormed a radical mosque in Islamabad.

The violence has raised fresh doubts among many Pakistanis about President Pervez Musharraf‘s unpopular alliance with the United States and its war on terrorism….

I hope that you and your team at the Peace and Freedom will be alright.

Relatively situation in Pakistan and tribal areas is peaceful, but the people have been feeling uneasiness. They think something big is going to happen. The people have been waiting for a big bang.

Politicians and army rulers are in war with each others. There are discussion and counter-claims by the rulers and politicians. They have forgotten that they are in war with terrorists. The terrorists have been taking advantage of this situation and have been strengthening their positions.

Now according to my information, terrorists are planning attacks in whole world. I do not know, but maybe United States will be their target.

According to reports from various parts of Pakistan, Four Frontier Constabulary (FC) personnel and three militants were killed in two separate attacks when militants attacked a checkpost jointly manned by police and FC personnel in the Miran police precincts in Bannu as well as a checkpost in Tiarza on Wednesday.

Miran police station duty officer Qudratullah told Daily Times by phone that unidentified militants attacked the Norar checkpost, 12 kilometres from Bannu, at around 2:45am on Wednesday. He said that three FC men died in the attack, while three attackers were killed and two injured in retaliatory firing. However, the attackers managed to take their injured accomplices with them. Qudratullah said the militants attacked the checkpost from two sides and used rockets and other weapons. He said there were 10 FC personnel and seven policemen present at the checkpost at the time of the attack. The dead officials are havaldar Saeed Amin, lance naik Ishaq Ali and sepoy Bedar Bakht.

In another incident in South Waziristan Agency, militants fired rockets at the Tiarza checkpost, injuring six soldiers, military spokesman Maj Gen Wahid Arshad said. However, sources in Wana told Daily Times that one soldier was killed when militants fired at a military transport helicopter that was landing at the Tiarza helipad. Maj Gen Arshad rejected the report, saying that the militants attacked the security checkpost and not the helicopter. He said that the soldier later died of injuries sustained during the battle. Meanwhile, MNA Maulana Mirajuddin of the MMA has reached an undisclosed area in South Waziristan to hold talks with militants who recently kidnapped 15 FC soldiers.

Swat District Coordination Officer Syed Mohammad Javed has stopped NGOs from working in the district after they received threatening letters from suspected militants. Two NGOs – SPEED and PLAIN – which had set up offices near the office of the Swat DCO were sealed by the DCO. Militants have also sent threatening letters to Swat Serena Hotel and Mary Stopes, an NGO. Sources said the letters asked women performing in CD-dramas or working at beauty parlours to stop their “immoral activities”. Earlier, medical reps in Swat were asked to stop wearing paint/jeans and shirts as they are “un-Islamic dresses”.

I shall miss you during your absence, but I shall pray for peace and happiness for you.